Hollow
by thesynapticsnap
Summary: Pitch reaches Jack before the Guardians, and takes him on as an apprentice (Feb '13, x-posted)


A/N: x-posting from AO3 and tumblr. I've not used in years, so I'm just testing the waters with a couple gen ficlets I wrote earlier this year. If you're interested in seeing my AUs/mature fics/longer pieces see my AO3 (same username). Thanks for reading.

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Once, Jack had despised himself for the hollowness of his spirit. The children of the world passed through him when he opened his arms for their embrace upon the snowy hills and winterscapes of his creation. Though they felt nothing as his essence wafted past them like steamy breath in the winter air, each time the body of yet another child sank through him, it was if they had struck him. So purposeless did he feel being invisible to all others within the world. So lonely had he been without another to see him, and rest their hands against him to remind him that he was real.

As he crept through the window of a dark room on the second story of a quiet little home in a quiet little town, he was never happier that disbelief made him undetectable to others. Since finding his true purpose after all the years of silence from the Man in the Moon, he no longer wept alone, spilling mute tears that froze against his skin before they could fall to the earth. Understanding what he was meant to do at last freed him of his sadness, and the guilt he felt for never gaining renown enough for children to believe in his being. As a spirit of the night, Jack Frost remained unseen to deliver his purpose.

Once within, Jack settled on the edge of the bed where a child slept. A tendril of golden sand was shaping dreams above her head; upon this night, she dreamed of playing with her best friend, another little girl who loved to run and play pretend as much as she. Jack smiled at the innocence of the dream and the way it made the girl giggle softly in her sleep, and reached forward to brush away a strand of tangled hair that had fallen across her nose. The cold essence of his fingers tickled her and she sniffled. Sometimes he missed seeing the children like this, peaceful and lips curled into smiles. But to bring smiles and happiness was the job of North, and Sandy, and the Guardians. It was not the job of Jack Frost.

He felt the skin of his neck prickle with gooseflesh when his master arrived, the coils of his essence eventually settling as thin fingers against his shoulder. Jack sighed and closed his eyes, feeling the weight of another's touch, reveling in such a feeling after all the years it wasn't there.

"Jack," his master said softly. "I sense that you are weary."

"Hey Pitch," Jack replied, looking up to find his master studying him with concern. "I'm fine. Just thinking."

"Ah, an understandable cause for distress."

Pitch's fingers left a trail of warmth as they parted from Jack's shoulder, the tall, slender man wandering to where the child's hand was flung over the edge of her bed. Pitch touched it just as gently as he had touched Jack, and the little girl whimpered. Ah, so they had come upon one that still believed in the Boogeyman. Pitch glanced up at Jack from his kneeling position on the floor, his grin of sharp, white teeth shining as brightly as the moonlight that filtered through the window.

One of Pitch's long, graceful arms reached to touch the golden sand about the child's head. With but a single tap of the finger, the sand began to change before their eyes. The sand-children of the dream stopped in their playtime and shook at the blackness that crept up their legs as if to throw it off, but to no avail. Soon the blackness had veined through every part of the dream, and the figures collapsed into a puddle of dark dream sand.

When shapes arose anew, the girl's friend was no more. Alone the girl sat in her dream, hugging her knees to her chest and weeping softly. The scene made Jack's heart ache, for the girl's greatest nightmare was also his own. To be alone, and unwanted by anyone in the world…

"Jack."

He had not even noticed Pitch materialize behind him so intent was his focus on the nightmare. He turned to look up at the one that had taken him in, that had shown him his life meant more than empty laughs and pranks forgotten in mere hours. Pitch had been the first to embrace him, the only one to ever guide his frost across the realms of dreams and let him see it could shape entirely new worlds.

Pitch's hand settled on top of his own, letting Jack feel the pressure of another's touch to sooth him for a few heartbeats, before he tapped a finger against the staff in Jack's opposite hand.

"Come now, you've been doing so well lately. Show me a little fun, Jack."

When the crook of his staff touched the lonely little figure in the girl's nightmare, frost spider-webbed across the surface of the sand. For a moment, it looked as if the ice would envelope the blackness, but it merely left cracks throughout as it melted into the slowly swirling sand below the figure. Jack watched it build a foundation and rise up brick by brick into a little home, though the home was a single room without door or window. The figure within lowered its head to its knees as the top of the room creaked closed, and that was the last they saw of it. The little girl whimpered into her pillow and Jack turned away before he saw a tear.

"There now," Pitch soothed him. "How many times must I tell you?"

"Not everyone gets to be a Santa Claus or an Easter Bunny," Jack said hollowly, as Pitch has told him many times before.

"Indeed. There must be those of us who are stronger, who are willing to cast aside our own desires for the sake of harmony within our world. There would be no joy without pain, Jack. The Guardians would mean nothing without us."

And even if it didn't make the ache go away in that moment, it was enough.


End file.
